Gestural specification using dynamically-defined articulatory structures

Abstract

The types of analyses required within a framework that uses dynamically-defined articulatory gestures as the primitive units of phonetic description are outlined. The overall approach is then exemplified using investigations into an overlap hypothesis of reduced vowels, specifically the hypothesis that the difference between the bisyllable “beret” and the monosyllable “bray” can be attributed to a difference in the overlap of the labial closure and tongue rhotic gestures. This overlap hypothesis is supported by a perceptual test of simulations of the utterances as well as by preliminary articulatory analyses of X-ray microbeam data, and leads to some possible overlap typologies for reduced syllables.